What if we knew our life’s purpose with absolute clarity? What energy we could draw on! How free we would be from worrying about unimportant noise and distraction!
Even better, imagine we understood how to fulfil it. It’s possible, but it demands great self-awareness, intimately knowing who we really are.
Ken Wilber is a polymath who knows and respects numerous non-dual traditions, western philosophies and therapeutic approaches, but he enjoys a special affinity with Dzogchen. My own simplification of this Buddhist tradition is that all is eternally perfect, with no need or opening for intervention or improvement of any kind.
Ramesh Balsekar’s core message is unpalatable to believers in personal free will. Many non-dualist teachers hold their assault on free will until late in the progression of their teachings, looking to ‘soften the ground’ first with other aspects of perspective shifting. But Ramesh moves straight to it from his starting axiom of non-dualism: All there is is consciousness, and consciousness is all there is.
Although we can acquire or achieve with impressive frequency, although we can discard or dodge with admirable efficiency, the holes we fill and blights we escape always give way to new ones! There is no end to satisfying our wants or escaping our dislikes, but there is a deeper current to this stream of life.
As persons, we are objects, with pasts much greater than our age and futures more enduring than our life expectancy. But we are special objects, each with a unique subjective window on the world. And within your window is yourself, both as subject and as object.
I see Now.
I see Me,
And in Me, me.
Here is clear
Perception of the perfection
In reality, My reflection.
To discover who we are, our investigation first identifies what we are not. We notice a hypnotic array of perceptions, thoughts, and feelings, but these mental objects — on their own or together — are not us. We are what experiences them, that which knows them. As these objects change, instant-to-instant, what remains the same?
The ego has an antagonistic relationship with the present moment. Only the ego rejects anything as it happens. Included in that “anything” is the ego itself. So, if you ever notice yourself fighting the ego, then you’re actually noticing the ego fighting the ego! The noticing is powerful. The fighting is…well…self-defeating.
My ascent from the underworld complete, I emerge from the shaft into daylight and rejoin the path to Mountain City. The trail is no more than a series of cairns marking a route among the boulders through which I pick my way. With the sun at its zenith, a fortress town comes into view, and I continue in the shadows of its ramparts before crossing the drawbridge at the eastern gate.
As the tunnel curves to the right, a flickering light casts onto its left wall. Soon enough, the channel opens into a small cave, a table at its center. On it burns a candle. A plump woman sits behind the table, her shoulders shaking. Is she distraught? But a few seconds’ closer listening reveals soft chuckles, synchronized with her shoulders’ rhythm. A gentle laugh, but one that fills her body.
As you read the book in your hands, you follow Harry Potter’s journey from indistinct and unloved orphan to powerful wizard. But while Harry exists as this beguiling character, he does not exist as that which the story makes him out to be — a real boy wizard in the real world, a boy who experiences what is happening like you do.
slumberfogey: Readers are going to think my old man humour is contagious. Now, remind me who you are. I need to see whether we need to backtrack at all after our break.
pilgrim: I don’t think we do! I am the experiencer of my experience.
slumberfogey: Who are you?
pilgrim: You recognise me, don’t you? I’m Gary, but you always call me pilgrim.
slumberfogey: So “Gary” is your name or “pilgrim” labels you, but is either who you are?
slumberfogey: You’re handling this moment with the precision of a World War II bombardier. Imagine yourself more like a laser eye surgeon. What Is Happening?
pilgrim: I’m imagining myself as a laser eye surgeon.
slumberfogey: Are you taking the piss? Okay. How are you certain you’re imagining yourself as a laser eye surgeon?
pilgrim: Well, the ad said I could get enlightenment, or something like that?
slumberfogey: Is that what I said? Bit naughty of me. Felt like I needed to talk up the product to get people’s attention. Do you want your money back?
pilgrim: I didn’t pay anything.
slumberfogey: Ah. Just as well.